FREESOUND SAMPLES USED IN THE CURRENT MIX#01-I used many dronetails by Jovica.Which ones?Who knows?I renamed them.Sorry about that Jovica-You have many good samples-good for transitions.Thanks#02-24175_patchen_dropping#03-25075_FreqMan_whoosh07_with_pan#04-14308_wingz_prayBahai#05-14308_wingz_prayBahai#06-14310_kostasvomvolos_Waterphone_1#07-15488_djgriffin_tibetan_chant_4_colargol_2#08-19029_sazman_060501_ezan_yeni_camii_complete#09-23722_milo_ship2_bergen.wav#10-27160_Piero_Pepin_Ethiopian_Xmas_in_Addis_Abeba_07_01_2006#11-28282_genghis_attenborough_Imam_May_04#12-7527 _jesges_alien_factoryDark Thoughts by Nora Gardner Saskatchewan Film Cooperative's Splice -04/03/09-Like any film or video maker, I am interested not only in a work’s look and sound - I am also interested in the story of its making and where it gets to travel once it is completed. This is the story of Dark One, the first feature length work of Darryl Miller, completed in 2007. There is plenty to be fascinated with in this film as Miller is a obsessively gifted sculptor of both the visual and sound mediums.I’d like to say, however, that I am as equally appalled as I am fascinated by this work. The subject matter of drug abuse, self-destruction, nightmarish delusion and death are so depressing in nature that to consider a character in such pain is a tragedy. Here, the overwhelming tragedy is that this film documents a human life - that of Dan Biholar whose “search for his soul” through drug abuse results in poverty, jail time, multiple hospitalizations, mental illness and a wasted life. In a lucid moment, Biholar says “I wanted to destroy myself, but I couldn’t - so here I am.” The sometimes seemingly prophetic, more often delusional reveries of Biholar, which have been equated with the stream-of-consciousness poetry of William S. Burroughs, are further shaped by Miller to take on demonic tonal proportions as incantations for Miller’s complex multi-layered visual nightmare representing Biholar’s inner psychic experience as a drug-addicted poet. “All the dark dreams and nightmare screams come to light”, says Biholar in the film.Miller constructed Dark One over the course of nine years. The film transcends as many boundaries in cinematic language and genre as it does in the technological advancement of video and digital media. Miller documents Biholar’s life in Hi-8 (w/ some final shooting in Digital 8), while employing avant-garde techniques, rigorous editing and multiple image manipulations to present the audience with the uniquely uncomfortable ordeal of joining Biholar in his forays into drug abuse. Miller does this by using out-of-focus, de-saturated, and diffused images, multiple filters and masks, the look of multiple exposures, kaleidoscopic images and psychedelic visual effects. For the most part, he used Photoshop, Boris FX and After Effects to achieve his ends. Miller said he found Boris FX to be the most user-friendly when working with transparencies. He combined these visual elements with soundscapes created from the words and poetry of Biholar, sound samples and music. The soundscapes are as distorted and complexly-layered as the visual elements. He recommended the use of sound samples from the Free Sound Project. While working on his sound, Miller used a SoundToys plug within Pro Tools and completed the work in Pro Tools LE.The genres of Canadian Documentary, German Expressionism and American Experimental film are immediately called to mind when viewing this film. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Dark One received acclaim at Hot Docs when it premiered in 2007 at the festival and was nominated for the Best Canadian Feature Documentary Award. Following on the heels of Hot Docs, Miller travelled to Jihlava in the Czech Republic after his film almost made it into the programme of the International Documentary Film Festival Jihlava. He said because Dark One almost made it into the programme in 2007, they requested the film for the new Documentary Film Centre's archive in Prague, to be studied by students at FAMU, and viewed by journalists, film professionals and the public in general. The festival in Jihlava discovers authorial documentary film, and follows the motto of “Thinking through film!” FAMU is one of oldest film schools in Europe. On the following site http://www.dokument-festival.cz/new_index.php under the Thinking through film! link “authorial documentary film” is described as “A work of art voicing a unique experience, connecting existence and essence, that arise and die out in each other.” This caption does indeed describe work such as Dark One.Even more fortunate, Dark One was accepted into the programme of DOK Leipzig in 2007 and Miller was in attendance for a number of screenings at the festival. DOK Leipzig is one of the leading international film festivals for documentary and animation in the world. Upon his return from Germany, I went to Cupar, Saskatchewan to interview Miller about his film. Despite all the trials and tribulations of intermittent funding, fickle software, unreliable technology, and a bad screening here or there, Miller was grateful for the financial support of the Canada Council, the Saskatchewan Arts Board, and SaskFilm. He was also adamant in his appreciation for the enormous amount of support that he received from his partner Elaine Pain, who is also the film’s executive producer.While tired in appearance, Miller seemed confident about finding a niche market and distributing his unusual feature length film. Of Dark One, which he described as an ambient epic approach to storytelling, Miller says: “There are a lot of ways to tell a story.” Continuing in a frugal fashion, as any independent filmmaker would these days, Miller found the https://withoutabox.com/ service for independent film distribution to be a great starting place. Information about Dark One, including several trailers, is available at numerous blogspots such as http://icecubefactory.blogspot.com/, appears on IMDb, Amazon, and the complete film will shortly be featured on Punk TV and MyDocumentary.ca. Miller does appear to be mastering the arts of self-promotion and finding niche-markets for distribution.In closing, I will return to the film’s story and the life of Dan Biholar. The film concludes with the death of Biholar’s mother Elena, an Auschwitz survivor with horrible dreams of her own, and foreshadows a continued downward spiral for Biholar, himself. Wishing to complete his promotional work for Dark One and take up work on a new project, Indoctrination (working title), Miller reminded me to complete this article. My final question for Miller was to ask about how well Biholar is doing these days. Miller confided: “Dan is still writing, but his words are becoming more confused… I am concerned for him… He is depressed and wants to work on his art, but even when he has the time, he either sleeps or is out searching for more drugs.” Biholar’s only saving grace, the redemption that he seeks in the film, is documented by Dark One. However, Biholar himself remains a lost soul and will never be able to claim what he seeks. But then again, perhaps, the search is all there is…

My own personal post-script, an observation (downtown): Spring is here. The mentally-ill walk among us, no matter how they got there, remember sometimes we are them (it’s a delicate balance). Be kind. Wishing you all - the best in mental health.

Review from John Thomas Frederick" MAGNIFICENT ! I am fortunate to have received today one of the first DVD copies of the film "Dark One" by Darryl Miller. I just finished watching it on my 32" Sony, and I was completely blown away ! Darryl has painted a masterpiece of visual images. Think what you want of the Documentary subject-matter (the Review posted by Cyberite is so far off; he/she obviously didn't get it !)( Cyberite's Hotdocs Review is on the HotDocs Dark One review page. ) Darryl documents Dan's journey with such honesty that he manages to capture both sides of drug addiction; the junkies side and the observers side, without forgetting to show Dan's spiritual and intellectual aspects. Dan is not dehumanized by his drug use or by Darryl's document. My impression of Dan after watching the film, is that Dan is an intellect and by way of his own spiritual, (maybe even Mystical), experiences, has developed a keen, intellectual, even theosophical intuition for his own spiritual nature and for the Metaphysical nature of his life and environment. Darryl seems to understand this and remembers to document this aspect of Dan. Darryl also seems to see the value in; and the importance of Dan's creative outlet of poetry and visual art. Many documentaries on drug abuse or on drug users tend to ignore these Human aspects of the junkie; turning he or she into an object of curiosity only; something to be viewed by 'the rest of us' at a safe distance. In this film Dan is all of us and none of us. He is a human like the rest of us and a soul like no one else. Many who watch the film may not realize that Dan is himself the writer and performer of most of the lyrics and poetry put to music by Darryl in the film. All this aside, the film is the most fantastic painting of moving images and color I have ever seen. Musicians creating music in the 'Psychedelic' Genre should be lined up at Darryl's door begging him to create their next Music-Video. Film-makers and editors who have seen the film must be scratching their heads wondering how he did it and asking their doctors for ant-depressants as they try to recover from their jealousy induced depression caused by a sudden and utter drain on their self-esteem. Anyone who can't see the superb artistry in the flow of the images and color has no idea how many years and hours it must have taken (did take) Darryl to make this masterpiece. Above all, that is how I see this film; as a visual masterpiece ! In my eyes and ears it is an Art piece before it is a documentary and its showing should not be limited to just documentary festivals. Anyone who appreciates the visual arts will find this film entrancing and a real piece of eye-candy. I also loved the sounds and music; but I may be a bit biased since I have been collecting and listening to Darryl's music for 20 years. Darryl lovingly gives me credit for ' additional keyboards' at the end of the film, but honestly and humbly, I must admit, that his mastery at sound editing and manipulation makes it virtually impossible for me to recognize any of the synthesizer playing that I did on one or two tracks on one or two of the musical pieces; 20 years ago in my parent' basement while Darryl and I drank and smoked our way deep into the night (and sometimes on until morning.) Darryl has been for more than 25 years a master of recorded sound enhancement and manipulation, now after finally seeing "Dark One" I can without bias and with complete confidence, pronounce him, a master of the moving image. Thank-You Darryl; after waiting all these years for you to complete the film, I can honestly say it was worth every minute of the wait. BRAVO !Miyako HotDocs ReviewInteresting and Esoteric. The pet bird facilitated the kindess,humility and benevolence the protagonist had for all living beings despite the lifestyle addiction can have on the affect and behavior of humans.Nathan Southern - All Movie GuideSanity, for the half-burnt out poet Dan Biholar, is growing ever tenuous. With ruinous, bleak and empty days sitting in his yellowed kitchen and coiffing morphine alongside his concentration camp survivor mother and his pet bird, Biholar reaches out to latch onto the literary brilliance now often eluding his grasp. Emotionally, Biholar plummets through a host of phases, from extreme depression to poetic bliss to unbridled mania - often without transitions or in-between lulls. With his documentary Dark One, avant-garde director Darryl Miller (once a down-and-outer himself, who rebounded) witnesses Biholar in his most private and intimate moments. Miller travels one step beyond, however, by then recreating, with his cameras, the hallucinatory mental state experienced by Biholar - an onslaught of dissonant sound and visual fury. The director thus unifies the audience, sensorially, with the film's subject.QOKEQUIHALLIA'S HotDocsREVIEW -Dark One beckons you to follow the rabbit down the hole and screams at you to stop at every turn. Having done the drugs and traveled sections of that route with Darryl, I can attest to the authenticity of the dimensional shifting and gravitational pull that influences our own perception and how that looks to others watching. Dark One shines through the facets of life that accompany hard drug abuse that often go neglected in the glorification of the war on drugs and the message of abstinence. Looking at family and relationships in ways that push you to look deeper into your own judgments of what a junkie is. As a viewer you have to be in for some psychological rough trade and the visual overload that can become abundant in drug induced hallucinations. Music and art that show originality and craftsmanship as alive and well as ever.................David Sloma Rockin' FilmsI really liked the film! Looking forward to a surround sound mix. The soundtrack CD is awesome too!Great stuff, Darryl...stunning! I remember when I saw this at HotDocs on the BIG screen..blew me away! Dan's words are an inspiration to me, as a fellow creative type.Matt Caravella from Boris FX, Inc. comments....Fantastic Job. A wonderful and creative use of compositing and effects. Best of luck with the film, surely it will not be overlooked. Again, terrific work.CBC Anonymous ReviewDark One was an intense, documentary detour on an afternoon of multiple screenings. Your creativity in imagery & sound is humbling.Wilfred GayleardI got to see this last weekend, it is amazing. Darryl does once again an amazing job of constructing a complex montage of visual and sound editing. Sounds great and looks beautifulChristianaPicturesGreat score. Nice "film" treatment on the footage. An interesting character. I'd definitely check it out at a fest or Netflix.Artwork Scan#1 - Fragments of Dan's painting discussed in Dark OneArtwork Scan#2 - Fragments of Dan's painting discussed in Dark OneArtwork Scan#4 - Fragments of Dan's painting discussed in Dark OneUnfortunately the Filmeck screening in Leipzig Germany had technical difficulties. Audio was poor and the projection bulb was on it's last legs. The "nato" screening went well !!! :) Sounded wonderful, looked great, and there was an extensive question and answer period after. It was here I had an in depth conversation withDetlef Kuhlbrod,a writer from Berlin . Read his impressions of Dark One below....or in the article titled "Gestorben wird uberall"in"Tageszeitung", the German national newspaper.For a couple of days,I was with the Canadian filmmaker Darryl Miller,whose experimental documentary "Dark One" , I was very impressed with.A difficult psychedelic film on the level of technology.It is about the morphine addicted poet Dan Biholar,with his mother,who was in Auschwitz.The reality shocks between drug images,hallucinations and history of the mother.The perspective of the film is extremely fickle; infected by Miller's own drug history. Exhausting,sad,radical,psychedelic, sometimes with a little gallows of humor; when a little bird, totally uninterested in fact, always on the verge of small tin bowls.The kitchen cabinet in black and white,for a small moment of clarity again.The drug-addicted artist who logically as a teenager began to emulate Burroughs, loves this bird is very fond of him and then told,almost entirely,as this bird dies,it would be the fifth or seventh dead bird in a few years.A film,in which the spirits dropped,as it were....An Envoy of the "Human Rights Documentary Days" from Kiev, a soulful - looking man who inspired me to a Russian mystic recalled or Andrzej Rublev (quickly gets you into stereotypes);The least hardly spoke English and yet shy and seemed curious, felt of "Dark One"also directly addressed.The film was such an existential thing.That is something quite different from the more or less good at documenting performance of a subject.Of course, Miller was much too long (eight years) in the movie.Darryl Miller was the first time in Europe and had a heavy travel behind him.A week earlier,he was at a film festival in the Czech Republic and had been robbed.Fortunately,he had not had so much money on.During the day he ran through Leipzig and filmed trams and trains.There were many policemen on Oct 31, because of the football in the city;Many people on the street or in the tram.Always pretty nervous;On the verge of paranoia probably; Many people whose language he spoke not;Yes, he lives in a town with 600 inhabitants,and this was but sometimes too much.Now he flies back grad direction toward Saskatchewan.Somehow ...The director... I had a couple of beers, a smoke, and just thought.DETLEF KUHLBRODTCockroachesA VERY GREAT WORK THIS FILM ! THIS FILM BRINGS THE REALITY OF THE DRUG EXPERIENCE WITH THE PSYCHOLOGY OF A HUMAN , BUT THE MAIN ARTIST IN THIS FILM Mr BIHOLAR HAS A VERY STRONG LIFE POWER, AND I THINK SOME '" ENLIGHTENMENT " , A NORMAL PERSON NEVER MAKES IN THIS LIFE. RESPECT TO Mr DARRYL MILLLER AND HIS WORK ! GREETS : Michael ( GERMANY )Lordofallfire -Jan 08/2007- It's more of an experience than anything else. All the fx, visual and audio are very cool. I kept thinking to myself, 'how did he do that?'. I know a bunch of Photoshop stuff so I have a slight idea what was happening with some of it. There are so many little things in the visual collages that I'll have to go back and watch it again to catch them all. I was kinda thrown off at first by the actual raw colour footage, but then it made sense with the content to bring some realism to the doc. I thought it was funny but worked really well when you and the subject are driving by the Lakeview Food place and the 7-11 and you blur out the whole image to hide the signs. At times it reminded me of Naqoyaqatsi (love the Qatsi trilogy) but also added a disjointed narrative to it. To be honest, I had an idea to do an experimental doc for a few years but never understood of how I could pull it off. This is pretty much how I would have pictured it, so thanks for stealing my idea, haha, JK. Not a lot of people will like this or even get it, but there are those of us who live for it. Hope it ends up doing well. The music was way, way awesome. .... and where your feeding him his lines, haha, so good!luckplc | 01/10/2008 10:27 AM --5 out of 5 stars"Darryl Miller weaves a spellbinding ride into the scary zone. Drawing on all the experience Darryl has had with drugs and alcohol, a story winds itself around the mind of Dan Biholar stitching the influence of drug addiction to a soaring spirit yearning to break free. The door to the other side is all the way open and the weirdness is leaking out."the_guinness-10.1.2008 9 out of 10 starsYou don't know it yet but Darryl Miller is a master film maker. Dark One is a trip that grabs a hold of you and first strips you of reality then tosses you to the demons lurking just on the other side of drugs and booze. For those experienced this is a ride through it with road signs to the freaky bits. For the rest of you, talk with your psychologist and bring a hand to hold on to. Bravo Darryl!K00k00s', an artist I met in Jihlava, has contacted me a number of times in regards to Dark One. Here are his kind words....Oct29-"we met in Jihlava, 2 days ago, I am Jan... long-hair-bad-English-animator. Today I opened my wallet and saw your calling card - after watching your videos and translating some sentences, I leave with eyes and mouth wide open. Your videos are very suggestive and so atmospheric. Well done!"Jan15-"I am listening to your music now, and its brilliant! Very impressive, deep and atmospheric! I like it! I made this fractal montage, while listening to your soundtrack.Do you think it is possible to use some of your songs in some of my noncommercial projects?"http://dumb.ic.cz/fist3/fist3.htmlLen GieniDark but good. Couldn't stop watching.Alex ConradoI like your aesthetic. ENHORABUENA¡¡¡ I'm impressed by your work. Felicidades¡¡SinnerFirei`d like to say that I'm impressed to say the least....your work has a real magical quality to it that takes your breath away at times and swallows u up the rest ...:) Really like the movie....evil as fuck...peace.A Million MindsDUDE your music is kickass! I love the rawness of it!That "dark one" movie looks pretty eerie! But cool.I like your psychotic nature. I mean... human nature. hehe

Indoctrination Music in Progress

Indoctrination

Indoctrination coming soon to a theater near you....Music by The Qube.CockroachesDan Biholar Chris GavinDarryl Miller- a new sound and focus has begun- a new adventure to explore.THE QUBE IS COMING.Indoctrination-a 3 CD Spoken word / soundscape adventure and Experimental Feature Film exploring intelligent design, the evolution of man's spirituality and his compassion for humanity, while destroying himself and the world due to character flaws. A drug addicted street poet's musings on man's role, human nature, self examination and spirituality warped through perceptions of mass media, art and literature. In the end, the truth of events becomes secondary to our perception of these events, and the world we live in.

DOK Leipzig Short Write Up

Dark One - Darryl Miller, Canada 2007, 88 minThe son a morphine addict, the mother a Holocaust survivor. The madness of a family on a hypnotic trip with Australian parrot.

HotDocs Summary

A drug-addicted poet searches for spiritual redemption as he cooks up morphine at the kitchen table with his Auschwitz survivor mother and pet bird. This brilliant, hallucinatory immersion into the psyche of Dan Biholar, a soul spiraling into oblivion, pushes the medium of the moving image about as far as it can go. Biholar vacillates between moments of acute self-awareness, disturbing darkness, tender sentiment, lyrical inspiration and delusions of grandeur. Award-winning experimental filmmaker and sound designer Darryl Miller was once in Biholar's shoes. With unsettling accuracy, Miller sculpts a sensory overload of hypnotic soundscape and half-melted psychedelic imagery that submerges us in Biholar's altered states. There is no safe distance from which to observe this visceral blurring between art, psychosis and reality-let's hope our sanity returns when the lights come back on.

DARK ONE INTERVIEW – GG interview with Darryl Miller
GG: With Dark One, you've created some beautifully sophisticated visual effects times with an intricate and powerful soundscape that, for many who watch it, it feels as if they experience, rather than simply observe, what your main subject Dan Biholar goes through. Did you do this intentionally, or did it happen organically?
DM: This film does not promote drugs...but it does very effectively enter the mind of an addict...It allows people not on drugs to experience an altered state experience like being on some drugs. When you are a drug addict, it feels as if the world is melting. Reality is just one option... one path among many. The memories from my hard drug days are burnt into my brain and I have been trying to recreate the experience on film and more recently digital video since I was a student at the University of Regina. This film gave me an opportunity to explore these techniques in a much more controlled environment using recent computer and software advances. I realised that I could enter the mind of my subject, rather than just observing... Of course this is only my perspective of what I think Dan could be feeling or experiencing at the time, based on my own past experiences with the same issues. I could enter Dan's head (a scary place at times) and allow the spectator to experience the situations in the film. Some of this is done by framing, extreme close-ups, and multi layer transparency effects and various melting filters in the Programs Boris Effects and After Effects.
GG: How did this mind-altering film come to be?
DM: I started working on a poetry/soundscape project with Dan. During this process, crazy things were happening over at Dan's. I decided that I would document some of the proceedings (it was always a spectacle of some sort or another). I was very surprised at the footage that I shot. I couldn't believe what Dan and his mother were doing and saying, and decided to make a film about the poetry project and Dan's life. The Saskatchewan Arts Board had helped with the funding for the audio cd and I decided to apply to The Canada Council for a grant based on my footage and poetry/soundscape work. After trying a few different technical approaches, I started working with Adobe Premiere and Adobe AfferEffects using variations of the multitudes of free Photoshop plugins on the web. Halfway through the video shoot I discovered that my Cannon L1 Hi8 camera I had been using started having problems.... This was after I transferred everything with time code to video, and it all looked great, I thought the camera just needed a little maintenance...I was wrong...They fixed the alignment and now all my footage to that point had a massive tracking problem. Here is where computers came in extremely handy. By re-photographing some of the footage, cropping, filters, and some creative editing.... I was able to rescue most of the footage that I knew would never occur again in a million years.... In fact, I liked the look that had been achieved on those scenes and went to work matching unaffected footage to match. I've had to make do my whole life using obsolete equipment and found a way to make it work (it always takes time though).
GG: Documentary filmmakers always have to negotiate boundaries, but as someone who was once addicted to drugs, how did you keep your distance from Dan's addiction and his dark delusions?
DM: It was very difficult to deal with both of these issues. As I am a recovering addict, the cravings are always there. One nice thing is I could at least escape out to the country with my wife and dog. We live in Cupar where there are no temptations ... ok ... very few I am aware of. As for the dark delusions...this was my second dilemma. I'm not so sure that all of them are delusions, and they may indeed be based in some sort of reality and or dimension that we as human beings can sometimes tap into when reaching or achieving different states of consciousness and awareness. Some of the delusions are just that... delusions inspired and caused by extreme morphine and drug withdrawal. But some of them...
At a very young age I had a number of what you would call paranormal or just plain freaky experiences that I have explained as spiritual in nature and also quite disturbing, All of this occurred with the use of drugs or alcohol. In one of my fairly Christian phases in my life, I experienced the shadow creatures (referred to many times in the film) in my friend’s basement. It was quite traumatic and definitely left it's mark on me. It's true what they say..."when you cross the line, it's hard to get back". I could write a book about what I think it all means and what happened but we're here to talk about Dark One. Later in my life (in late teen years and early 20's) I experienced the shadow creatures again. Unfortunately, in this time of my life I was heavy into Pot, LSD, MDA, Coke, Booze (You name it-including shooting), and was very unprepared to deal with the creatures since some of my faith and conviction had been stripped away by the drugs. Doing research on the subject and talking to others with similar experiences, I came to a conclusion that some of this stuff has got to be real but intangible and almost impossible to prove .I read somewhere that hundreds of thousands have experienced similar things... especially under the influence of drugs. Problem is...the longer you do drugs , the more your brain deteriorates...I'm quite crazy now also...But... I may have gotten into drugs + booze because of the many odd and strange (hallucinations) I experienced long before I got into drugs.... I believe drugs can open your mind enough to allow you to see things that are around us all the time (think of it as another dimension, that most people refuse to acknowledge exists).... problem is drugs are addicting and eventually warp these perceptions.... probably better to be a Buddhist monk or something.... The spiritual aspect of life is important and many concepts many addicts struggle with in this regard...do have some merit.... I believe there is a God, a devil, angels, and spirits...I've seen them! Back to the film.... how did this affect me personally while shooting and editing...let's just say I'm on antidepressants now. No demons lately.
GG: Do you have any advice for the audience who is coming to see your film?
DM: Be prepared. Some of the images are intense, disturbing, and not for the faint of heart. Just try to melt into the experience and not think too much about everything that is said or done. There is a lot of information to absorb and many levels of meaning. I'm still noticing some and I've worked on this for over 9 years. I guess that's what the DVD will be good for...You may not want to watch it again, but you might have to watch it a few times to get most of the concepts, ideas, and underlining meanings, The film is as much about some of my experiences as well as Dan's thoughts and experiences, among other things. Just remember.... It’s not real.... Or is it?

Gisèle Gordon-Hot Docs 2007 Canadian Programer

We thought it was truly brilliant, the first time I watched all the way through and the second, when I dropped more deeply into it. You’ve truly exploited the plasticity of the medium in a way that makes absolute sense for this film. I felt that tingly feeling that you get every few years when you connect with a truly great work of art.

In Dark One, Regina filmmaker Darryl Miller fuses the story of drug-addicted poet Dan Bilohar with experimental filmaking to create a 'documentary' that's difficult to describe: a mezmerizing soundscape laced with poetry, hallucinations and the poet's day-to-day life with his Holocaust-survivor mother and his pet bird. With the help of his wife Elaine Pain, Miller spent 9 years making the film, and the attention to imaginative detail shows us why. A former addict before he went to film school, he explained at the screening that he wanted to recreate what it was like to be high on hard drugs-- unless you've been there, it's difficult to say whether he succeeded-- -- but it's a wild trip, and a unique experience you won't soon forget.

Hospital Delusions

Dan Biholar Review In Retrospect Feb 12 2008

IT HAS TAKEN ME THIS LONG TO UNRAVEL THE INTENSE RESPONSE TO A MOVIE, A FILM THAT POSSESSES THE POWER TO PUSH ONE'S PERCEPTION TO IT'S SEEMING LIMITS ONLY TO BE EMOTIONALLY TOUCHED IN WAYS THAT AREUNEXPECTED AS MUCH OF THE FILM IS. FILM NOIR CANNOT CAPTURE THE VARIABLES THAT COME TOGETHER TO PRO DUCE A FILM THAT WILL MAKE YOU FEE....L,THAT WILL MOVE YOU IN WAYS THAT ARE FUNNY AS WELL AS TERRIFYING TO AWE STRUCK WONDER AS MY MOM [R.I.P-1928-2006.]TELLS OF LIFE IN A NAZI CONCENTRATION CAMP,A BEAUTIFUL YOUNG GIRL SURROUNDED BY DEATH,AND HER SUSTAINING COURAGE[SHE IS DEFINITELY THE 'HEROINE',AS I AM MUCH THE ANTI HERO AT THE HEART OF IT IT IS A RELATIVE CELEBRATION OF LIFE IN ALL IT'S FORMS AND POTENTIAL RELATIONSHIPS... A WONDERFUL STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESSMASTERFULLY EXECUTED AND ILLUSTRATEDFROM CONCEPTION TO PRESENTATION,A FILM DEFINITELY AHEAD OF IT'S TIME;TODAY'S ENIGMA ; TOMORROWS MASTER,AND I KN OW THAT THERE IS MORE TO COME FROM THESE VISIONARIES. DAN BIHOLAR

Boobaloo and the bunny

"Gestorben wird uberall" in "Tageszeitung"-translated

Documentary Film Festival Leipzig-Death is everywhere

Strange was felt, as the time passed, even with the opening of the 50thFestival for documentary and animation film in Leipzig. The pathos is gone, with the documentary many years in the political opening speeches and celebrated his truthfulness of the alleged hostile, alienating awareness against industry.It is factual and has become fairly mundane problems encountered: "After years of cost increases for stagnating budget, we can what has been achieved with existing resources no longer hold," says Festival Director Claas Danielsen. An exhibition and an extensive retrospective wisdom recalled the ambivalent GDR history of the festival. Initially, the oldest documentary film festival in the world.The animal Heinz Sielmann won one of the first prizes. Ideological be hardened to times of the Cold War. There were strange alliances at the end of the sixties, when West German filmmakers as "Jimi Hendrix at Altamont" konspirativ to Leipzig brought. The pragmatism with which Claas Danielsen for a few years, but the festival also as a meeting point position, first met some of the head. But not only the steadily increasing audience figures, but also the industry representatives give him right. It seems to me the festival, whose guest I since the mid-90s bin, a wonderful system in which serious films from all over the world, filmmakers, guests, audience and organizers six days intensively over the world and communicate with each other representation. This system works so well because the festival is manageable.The history of seeing films evolves, half chance, as in a good conversation. I was comfortable with the Canadian filmmaker Darryl Miller and came into the conversation because we both of which suffered so badly to be tightened. His jogging pants were dirty, because he is on the verge of a Czech film festival had been hijacked; I had made inattention to the way he was dressed. So we came into the conversation, and I was then in his film "Dark One." This is a difficult psychedelic film on the level of technology. It is about the morphine addicted poet Dan Bilohar, with his mother, who was in Auschwitz, and it is about the reality shock of the story of the mother, the hallucinatory Künstlichkeiten interrupt. Everything is infected by Miller's own drug history; Exhausting, sometimes blurred documentary, partly radically psychedelic. On the sidelines pitchforks, a small bird peaks repeatedly at small tin bowls, kitchen cabinet in black and white.Through Miller's film, I was on a dark track came in the eight-minute film "Jean Paul" by Francesco Uboldi dies. He was a man from his family and from his village in Cameroon violated.The filmmaker learns randomly from the story, which a lot of superstition has to do, and is to a tree geketteten man and brought filming. The face of the dying looks beautiful. Four hours after the shots dies Jean Paul.They threw the filmmaker, not to have helped; He replied credible that he would have had no chance.It was a matter of him gone, somehow, the dying to give a memento; He also that in a shocking settings, as the insects to sore joints of dying eat, have renounced. Also in the 100-minute, very impressive documentation of the British pioneer of Reality TV, Paul Watson, two people die. "Rain in my heart" accompanied four patients an alcohol withdrawal Station.The scenes are hardly bearable, in which the filmmaker patients in their recovery cases films; The position of director is shaky. For the woman whose husband just died, the accompanying camera friend. The film leads drastically the Dysfunktionalität the state health system in mind. In "Nothing to be scared of" Malgorzata Szumowska, however, almost serenely from the dying speech. Old masurische farmers sit on benches in front of their houses and tell how to help dying on their last journey, how to handle corpses bypasses. Embedded in traditions and rural communities of death still seems quite naturally to belong to life without terror.Of course gabs also different: the new, beautiful films by Gerd Kroske, Hartmut Bitomsky, Volker Koepp or Thomas Heise. Wunderbar was Sandra Prechtels and Sascha Hilperts portrait of a large, GDR in disgrace fallen Radsportlers, "Sports Lötzsch friend," and the simply wonderful debut film director of the Romanian Adina Pintilie, "Dont get me wrong." He plays in the psychiatric hospital. Two of the heroes are schizophrenic. One, a graceful, polite Lord, has the ability to deal with God to entertain; The other is convinced that rain to stop. Every day, the two on the grounds of the psychiatric hospital and quarrel with the utmost politeness: "Do not get me wrong, but...." DETLEF KUHLBRODT

Leader-Post Press Thursday, April 19, 2007(Mark Claxton)

Film hits close to home
Two longtime friends who have lived the highs and horrors of drug addiction now find themselves on opposite ends of a camera lens in a Saskatchewan-made feature film set to premiere at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival in Toronto.
Independent filmmaker and former Regina resident Darryl Miller was invited to the festival after organizers viewed his 88-minute documentary Dark One, which immerses the viewer in the mind and daily existence of Dan Biholar, a writer of poetry who continues to inject himself with morphine even as his mind and body suffer the ravages of the drug's effects.
Featuring stark computer-generated visual effects and readings of Biholar's poetry set to sound and music, the film follows its protagonist by weaving in and out of a hallucinatory world. Beginning its story through the eyes of Biholar's mother, a woman who survived Auschwitz only to watch his long, slow spiral into disintegration, the film then explores Biholar's cycles of lucidity and delusion as he seeks redemption in religious, spiritual and philosophical writings -- between hits of his drug of choice and interactions with his beloved pet bird.
"It comes in and out of reality," said director Miller in a telephone interview from his home in Cupar. "It's like you're doing drugs, without having to do drugs."
During a recent production session, one editor told Miller that in this film, 'reality is the effect.'
"He said, 'There's so much craziness, when you go back to reality, that's the shocking part,' " Miller recalled.
While Miller wrote, directed and produced the film, his wife and longtime filmmaking partner Elaine Pain served as executive producer.
"When this film began nine years ago, I didn't have grey hair and I had my own teeth," Pain said in a written statement for media. "Life has not been normal since."
For Miller, the completion of Dark One has been an obsession and odyssey that has left him emotionally and physically exhausted. A recovering addict who still deals with occasional cravings himself, he has spent innumerable days in the company of his friend, watching Biholar's drug-induced trances and --- perhaps more painfully -- filming his moments of clear-eyed awareness, regret and scarred wisdom.
"It's been a hard one to make," he said.
Initially, Miller intended only to produce CDs that would marry his friend's poetry to his own musical compositions. Eventually, however, "I decided to shoot some stuff, and all this dramatic footage started happening," he said. "Nine years later, here we are."
The project was also helped along by the relatively recent advent of digital film technology and editing software.
"Part of the problem was putting visuals to it, because it was so abstract," Miller said. "With computers now, you can do it."
On Friday, Miller will sit in the darkened Bloor Cinema in Toronto with other festival participants and watch his harrowing vision come to life on the big screen. His excitement and nervousness are apparent even as he ventures one candid opinion.I hope nobody goes (to the premiere) stoned. That would be a problem. This thing is intense enough when you're straight."
Miller is in discussions with the Regina Public Library regarding a potential screening of Dark One in September. By then, it's possible the film's promotional material could bill it as a winner of the Hot Docs Best Canadian Film category. While he hopes for the film's successful reception, he has higher hopes yet for Biholar, his friend of 20 years.
"He's drywalling now and he has some writing he wants to do," Miller said. "If he could get off that stuff, he would be quite brilliant."This addiction thing. It's a bitch."